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Lot Essay
In 1964, at the age of 40, the poet Marcel Broodthaers professed his allegiance to art. Over the next twelve years, he developed a vast multi-faceted practice that channelled his fascination with linguistic structures through a diverse range of media. Encompassing films, lectures, letters, prints, sculpture and painting, his work drew together an encyclopaedic variety of literary, social, political and historical themes, extending the lineage of his forebears Marcel Duchamp and René Magritte. His oeuvre was one of riddles, puns, wordplay, semiotic puzzles and visual non-sequiturs, underpinned by strategies of repetition, misdirection and appropriation. Within this complex framework, Broodthaers assigned particular importance to his multiples and editions: works which, by their very nature, compounded traditional notions of artistic authorship. ‘What is that characterises an art edition?’ he asked in the catalogue for his 1975 exhibition L’Angélus de Daumier. ‘The editions displayed in this room have given no answer to this question, for the simple reason that there is no formal difference between an art edition and that which isn’t’ (M. Broodthaers, quoted in N. Nobis, W. Meyer (eds.), Marcel Broodthaers. Katalog der Editionen Graphik und Bücher, Ostfildern-Ruit 1996, p. 10). Spanning almost the entire breadth of his artistic career, the following selection of works showcases the extraordinary technical and conceptual scope of this core body of work.
Chronologically, the group begins with La Faute d'Orthographe (Mea Culpa) (1964) – an early work that addresses the concept of autography. Based on a gallery announcement that misspelt his name, it turns the normally unseen act of corrective annotation into artwork’s primary subject. La Signature Série 1 Tirage illimité (1969) – comprising 153 sets of the artist’s initials – extends this theme. The fact that it was only issued in 60 copies, rather than the unlimited quantities promised by its title, transforms his signature from a mark of authenticity to one of insincerity. In Gedicht / Poem / Poeme - Change / Exchange / Wechsel (1973), Broodthaers co-opts his own initials again, this time purporting to calculate their monetary value in a variety of currencies. This type of institutional art-world critique played a fundamental role in his practice, most notably in his Musée d’Art Moderne, Département des Aigles: a fictitious museum concept which sought to deconstruct the politics of exhibition and display. Lettre ouverte (1972), Lettre ouverte (pas de surimpréssion) (1972) and Six lettres ouvertes Avis (1972) are all products of this enterprise, the latter comprising a sequence of headed letters denying similarity to any other existing museum department. In Tractatus Logico-Catalogicus (1972), Broodthaers directs his subversive commentary onto the role of the exhibition catalogue. Aping the title of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s 1921 tome Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus – a philosophical meditation on the interrelation of thought and language – the artist reprints six catalogue pages for a show of the same title, first held in 1970 and reprised in 1972. Laid out as if ready to be cut and folded, the order of the pages is scrambled: what was initially designed as a tool for understanding is stripped of all logic.
Throughout the grouping, further conundrums abound: from the encrypted hieroglyphics of Rebus (1973) to the optical trickery suggested by La Souris Ecrit Rat (A Compte d'Auteur) (1974) and the seemingly disconnected inventory outlined in Catalogue PBA du 27/9.74 au 3/11/74 (1974). At times Broodthaers’ draws inspiration from found objects: Chère petite sœur (1972) is based on a vintage postcard depicting an ocean liner sailing into port during a storm. With its note signed simply ‘Marie’, and its photographer unlisted, the image quivers with the ghosts of its unknown contributors – a condition magnified by Broodthaers ensuing film of the same title. In Le Manuscrit trouvé dans une Bouteille (1974), the concept of floating authorship is refracted through a more literary lens, invoking Edgar Allen Poe’s 1833 short story MS. Found in a Bottle. Housed in a box on which the title is printed in three languages, the work offers a dizzying tautology: the bottle’s inscription refers to ‘The Manuscript’ of 1833, whilst the manuscript itself – ironically not contained inside the vessel – simply describes the bottle and its subject. The relationship between the component parts – bottle, manuscript, title – is thus unhinged, caught in a never-ending cycle of self-definition. Like a traditional message in a bottle, it is a piece of communication cast adrift: one that might never be deciphered. In this regard, it forms an apt metaphor for Broodthaers’ practice as a whole.
Chronologically, the group begins with La Faute d'Orthographe (Mea Culpa) (1964) – an early work that addresses the concept of autography. Based on a gallery announcement that misspelt his name, it turns the normally unseen act of corrective annotation into artwork’s primary subject. La Signature Série 1 Tirage illimité (1969) – comprising 153 sets of the artist’s initials – extends this theme. The fact that it was only issued in 60 copies, rather than the unlimited quantities promised by its title, transforms his signature from a mark of authenticity to one of insincerity. In Gedicht / Poem / Poeme - Change / Exchange / Wechsel (1973), Broodthaers co-opts his own initials again, this time purporting to calculate their monetary value in a variety of currencies. This type of institutional art-world critique played a fundamental role in his practice, most notably in his Musée d’Art Moderne, Département des Aigles: a fictitious museum concept which sought to deconstruct the politics of exhibition and display. Lettre ouverte (1972), Lettre ouverte (pas de surimpréssion) (1972) and Six lettres ouvertes Avis (1972) are all products of this enterprise, the latter comprising a sequence of headed letters denying similarity to any other existing museum department. In Tractatus Logico-Catalogicus (1972), Broodthaers directs his subversive commentary onto the role of the exhibition catalogue. Aping the title of Ludwig Wittgenstein’s 1921 tome Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus – a philosophical meditation on the interrelation of thought and language – the artist reprints six catalogue pages for a show of the same title, first held in 1970 and reprised in 1972. Laid out as if ready to be cut and folded, the order of the pages is scrambled: what was initially designed as a tool for understanding is stripped of all logic.
Throughout the grouping, further conundrums abound: from the encrypted hieroglyphics of Rebus (1973) to the optical trickery suggested by La Souris Ecrit Rat (A Compte d'Auteur) (1974) and the seemingly disconnected inventory outlined in Catalogue PBA du 27/9.74 au 3/11/74 (1974). At times Broodthaers’ draws inspiration from found objects: Chère petite sœur (1972) is based on a vintage postcard depicting an ocean liner sailing into port during a storm. With its note signed simply ‘Marie’, and its photographer unlisted, the image quivers with the ghosts of its unknown contributors – a condition magnified by Broodthaers ensuing film of the same title. In Le Manuscrit trouvé dans une Bouteille (1974), the concept of floating authorship is refracted through a more literary lens, invoking Edgar Allen Poe’s 1833 short story MS. Found in a Bottle. Housed in a box on which the title is printed in three languages, the work offers a dizzying tautology: the bottle’s inscription refers to ‘The Manuscript’ of 1833, whilst the manuscript itself – ironically not contained inside the vessel – simply describes the bottle and its subject. The relationship between the component parts – bottle, manuscript, title – is thus unhinged, caught in a never-ending cycle of self-definition. Like a traditional message in a bottle, it is a piece of communication cast adrift: one that might never be deciphered. In this regard, it forms an apt metaphor for Broodthaers’ practice as a whole.